Bihar woman 'dies twice' in two days

Fri, Mar 12 11:15 AM
Sharda Devi's family was distraught when the woman was declared dead by doctors at a top Bihar hospital. But their grief turned to shock when the 45- year old woman 'came back alive' at her funeral pyre minutes before she was to be cremated.

While her family was happy to term it 'God's miracle', this was more a case of sheer apathy by negligent doctors at the hospital, whose almost indecent haste to declare the woman dead without proper tests paints a sorry picture of hospitals in the state.

Sharda was a resident of Daniyawan, about 40 km from Patna. She had been battling meningitis for some time and was admitted to the Patna Medical College Hospital ( PMCH) on Saturday. However, the next day, she was 'found dead' by the doctors, who promptly issued a death certificate ( No. ERM 5723).

Sharda's husband, 48- yearold Baso Pandit, said the doctors at the PMCH declared his wife dead on Sunday morning. Her relatives took Sharda's body back to their village for the last rites. ' But we didn't immediately cremate her,' Pandit said.

'We decided to wait for my daughter, who lives in Kanpur, so that she could see her mother one last time,' he added. 'My daughter arrived late on Sunday evening, after which we carried Sharda's body to the cremation ground. We placed her body on the funeral pyre and I was about to set it alight when we noticed some movement,' he said. 'My relatives and I didn't know what to make of it. 'I went ahead and lifted the sheet off Sharda's body and found that my wife had come back to life,' a shocked Pandit said.

Pandit and his relatives immediately rushed Sharda to a local doctor, who checked her pulse and heart beat and confirmed that she was alive. She was later admitted to a local nursing home. 'My wife was alive, and doctors at the PMCH declared her dead. This was absolute callousness on their part,' he said.

A large crowd thronged the Daniyawan nursing home after hearing about the 'miracle'. Unfortunately, her family's ecstasy was short- lived. The woman passed away during treatment at the nursing home- this time for real. Sharda's family blamed doctors at the PMCH for her death and alleged negligence.

They said she could have been saved had the doctors put her on a ventilator immediately after she was admitted to the PMCH. The PMCH administration refused to comment on the issue but doctors at the hospital said the death certificate was issued after Sharda was found 'clinically dead' ' There are certain criteria for declaring a patient dead,'they said. ' The death certificate is issued only after all criteria are fulfilled.'

Reproduced From Mail Today.